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"Crazy" Eddy Black
Overview Name: 'Edward Black '''Known Aliases: ''Crazy Eddy' '''Gender: '''Male '''Age: '''50's (looks like late 60's) '''Threshold: '''Torn '''Archetype: '''Bone Picker '''Geist: '''The Spiteful Lady Sophia '''Physical Description: '''Eddy's got a stocky build, hitting 5'10" on the rare occasion that he stands up straight. He moves with a bit of a limp in his left leg, and has a number of small marks and scars that indicate an exciting life. Life has not been easy for Eddy over the last few decades, and although he is surprisingly healthy for 50 years old, most people would guess closer to 60 at first glance (Contributing to this is the fact that he hasn't been clean shaven since December of 1989). He has dark brown hair, that has long since begun the losing battle with grey. His clothing is very typically worn and mismatched, and is the most obvious sign of his living condition. He typically sports boots and trousers from a rough, out-doorsy type, along with whatever shirt has the fewest holes and rips in it. He also typically wears a dark trench coat, stained and sun bleached in spots, regardless of the extremes of Florida climate. He carries with him a large duffel bag, much as many street people tend to. However, the things he keeps in there might strike most as 'odd' to say the least… Personality: Unstable, irritable, vulgar, tactless, aggressive, irreverent… These are some of his more charming qualities. Eddy has been on the streets of Orlando (more than one Orlando, it turns out) for a long time, and he has seen what else stalks the shadows. He comes across very clearly as grizzled and, not to a small degree, arrogant, often referring to it as 'his' city. Regardless, he has a sense of humor shallowly buried under the surface. His host of character flaws bely a deeper truth, however; that nearly everything he does is toward a single, driving purpose. The darkness, the evil, the cruelty of the word- he has felt it first hand, and long ago he devoted himself to stopping it from hurting others. He has the burden of knowing what is out there in the shadows. Consequently, he feels responsible for those that don't. He has stared the abyss in the face, wide eyed like a deer staring a car in the headlights. And he has plans on running the car over. Known History = The Road So Far… = Fire of Unknown Origin Eddy is, as far as anyone can tell, from another Earth originally. As a child of the sixties, he had a relatively normal youth. He went into the army to get out of Kansas, and ended up in Florida after several years in the service. He left the service and moved to Orlando to settle down with his then fiance, Sarah. Settling down was slow-going and troublesome, as it always is. Finding work became a small issue, until he found work with a P.I. firm. The transition to home owning had all the normal challenges, made into a kind of strange adventure by Sarah. He had it all- a job, a new life to look forward to, a home of his own, and the love of a good woman. The American dream. And a solid year of it he had. A Bad Moon on the Rise Orlando was supposed to be where they started over. It was supposed to be a happy place. It was supposed to be wholesome. Over that year, working the streets and looking hard where people seldom look, Eddy realized that it was none of those things. He never came face to face with the truth of the world, not in that time anyway, but he came within arms reach of it more than once. But it wasn't enough to change him- he went to work each day knowing that there were things he wouldn't understand. Then he went home each night, willing to set that knowledge aside for a decent night of happy sleep. Then came September 16th, 1989. He did not sleep that night, happy or otherwise. Sarah's body was identified the next morning, after the POLICE had combed the woods near their home. Because of the nature of the wounds she suffered, it was deemed an animal attack. People expressed their sympathies, friends offered their condolences, neighbors brought over casseroles- people can be strange at times like that. None of them, not even the police, saw what Eddy saw. They didn't want to think about the strange smells in living room, where the attack happened. They didn't want to try to explain the claw marks in the ceiling of the hallway leading outside. They didn't want to know why her tongue was missing, despite there being no other wounds to her face. They didn't want to understand- they wanted to set that knowledge aside, and go home for the night. But Eddy couldn't. This time, work had followed him home. He couldn't put the blinders back on anymore. He couldn't 'not' see the things in the shadows. He couldn't ignore the facts. He knew that some 'thing' had taken his Sarah from him. From that point on, it wasn't mourning, it wasn't heartbreak- it was vengeance. Six months went by. He lost his job first, and shortly thereafter his house. There was no other job and no other goal; his work fell apart and his possessions meant nothing to him. It was all a reminder of the things he'd held on to. What he'd ignored reality to cling to. All that mattered was finding the thing that did this to Sarah. Eventually, he lost hope, knowing that he had no friends, no leads, and no clues. The next several years are a strange sort of blur- a lot of that time he spent trying to climb through a bottle. A lot of that time he spent living on the streets. A lot of that time he spent afraid of and chasing shadows that weren't there. Stand Discovering that other people were looking into the shadows was a strange kind of vindication to Eddy. For years he had been a non-entity; he had gotten used to the idea. The idea that others would think the way he did was strange to him by that point. He played along, hoping to help the few that came along. It wasn't until a hopeless trio came along that he really got into the game; watching them while they were off their guard, pointing them in the directions they needed to look. A reporter, a banker, and a musician- He really didn't have much hope for them other than that they would survive their little jaunts in the shadows. But they surprised him, time and time again. Through them, he came to learn of a whole community of people who knew what was really out there, and worked against the monsters in the dark. That is not to say that he joined them in camaraderie and open arms, but knowing that he wasn't alone gave him enough strength to focus on his work, and the periods where his drinking got the better of him grew fewer and farther between. For a while, it was going well. He had helped people to deal with problems; problems where they couldn't go to anyone for help. When a UCF student was almost killed by the ghost haunting her dorm room, and he made the problem go away; that was when he realized that he was making a difference. When a beat cop's house got infested with some kind of bugs that drank his family's dreams at night, and Eddy found a way to exterminate them; that was when he realized that he was important. That Orlando needed him. He never imagined himself to be a hero. It wasn't a matter of being a champion or a do-gooder- it was a matter of people needing help, and the fact that there wasn't anyone else to do it. The city had things in it's shadows; they moved when you weren't watching. He knew that, and it was up to him to watch the shadows when they weren't looking. Then things took a turn for the strange. It was supposed to be a treasure hunting expedition- he had gotten word of an estate in the back woods of Georgia where an escaped Nazi with a BACKGROUND in Alchemy had supposedly hidden away. According to the rumors, a hoard of gold was going to be confiscated by the FBI, and Eddy went with a handful of others in the hopes of getting some of it first. About two dozen folks all showed up with similar ideas- the estate was sizable and, as they soon found out, booby-trapped. It didn't take long to realize that this German had actually been involved in some powerful magics. The zombies protecting the basement sorta gave that away. The mysterious alter in the garden was another sign. In the garden, there was a strange series of glyphs and markings that all lead to a stone circle. Those who stood in the circle heard a voice that whispered to them. The voice would offer answers, in exchange for blood. Eddy watched a man ask where he could find a BOOK that he had lost as a child. He watched the man squint as though listening hard, and saw a small gash open up on his hand, specks of blood welling up and soaking into the stone. It was then that Eddy did a very unwise thing. Standing in the circle himself, hearing the voice whisper to him, offering him knowledge and promising any question could be answered, Eddy asked a very poorly worded question. "What is all this? Explain all this occult crap!" When he regained consciousness, Eddy was told that he was lucky to be alive. One of the other treasure hunters said that he'd never seen anyone survive losing that much blood. Once he was able to get back on his feet, he rejoined the others as they were heading to the basement. Hours had passed, but strangely a number of the symbols and glyphs that lined the walls of the chamber suddenly had meaning to him. He was confused for a long time, and the hours that followed are even now a bit of a blur to him. Regardless, that's the day that his Mentor entered his life. Crazy Train The months that followed were strange ones; though it took him time to realize what was going on. There was a woman that he kept seeing, who seemed to be following him, who occasionally spoke in the strangest ways to him. She was attractive and capricious and cruel, and seemed to know everything about everything. She always seemed able to find him, no matter where he was hiding. When she started talking to him about magic and mysteries, he realized who, and what, she was. She was the whispering voice from the alter. She wasn't a woman; that was merely what it wanted him to see. It was the 'thing' that had made the deal. He had asked a question big enough; so open and broad that it would take years, decades to answer. He had given it an opportunity, and it had crawled up out of that little binding circle and into his head. She was the face that would teach him about the mysterious side of the world, and he was stuck with her. And teach him she did. He quickly began to learn about all manner of occult subjects. She taught him the secret laws of metaphysics, the strange theories and alien ideas of magical thought, the nature of ancient religions and the gods and monsters they believed in. What was surprising was that he learned it so quickly, and that it began to make so much sense to him. The first ritual he performed, a simple little incantation to abjure a spirit, was a milestone to him. At that point, he understood that he was dealing with the shadows on their own terms. Eddy made the choice, and was ready to arm himself with the monster's own weapons. You've Got Another Thing Comin' With new tools and a handful of friends, Eddy was able to make real progress. For the first time, he had real power. Time to time, he exercised it, and the monsters took notice. Along with a number of others, he helped keep the creatures of the night in check. More than once he walked in the Vampire court, giving them the chance to POLICE their own. He watched the machinations of sorcerous businessmen, and dismantled their machines in the cloak of night. When spirits threatened to consume the town, he and a handful of allies stood their ground and put down a small army of the possessed. His newfound abilities gave him the chance to make real progress, to make a real change behind the plastic facade of Orlando. In his little vendetta against the evils of the world, he was having a good run. Unfortunately, we all know what happens to a run of good luck. It had been a simple tailing job- he was only supposed to be watching this young vampire to see if it was breaking the rules and killing it's victims. It should have been simple. Instead, the job went monumentally awry, and ended with Eddy running, no backup, from a whole pack of the bloodsuckers. With no backup, not nearly enough firepower, and his exit strategy blown, he did the only thing he could think to do. He had a simple ability, something that would normally be safe to use to get out of a tight spot. Unfortunately, the circumstances were wrong, and he had to misuse the magic. He knew that there would be consequences for it. Turn The Page He awoke, and everything was just a little 'off'. The streets of his town were just a little different; the people he knew were slightly changed. The people he hunted with talked about groups and organizations he'd never heard of before. One of them, all of a sudden, was in some government Taskforce. Another was oddly more knowledgeable about demons than he had been the week before. It was Orlando, but through a mirror, darkly. But then again, what the hell? He knew there'd be consequences. No point worrying about it, right? Funny enough, he actually had a lot more success with his magic after that. The rituals seemed to come easier, the results a lot CLEANER. His friends (who still knew who he was, and he wasn't even going to try to figure that part out) had their shit together and were doing a lot more than pulling ghosts out of haunted buildings or conspiring against cabals of he-witch businessmen. It was a little strange, but things seemed better for him. True, the monsters of this Orlando seemed a lot more, well, monstrous, but it didn't matter. He had a chance to fight the good fight, and people needed saving in that town even more than before. When a batch of Roux-Ga-Roux cropped up in the city and slaughtered half a school, it was satisfying to take them down. When the presence of demons slowly grew stronger in town, pushing more and more people to vices, it was a joy to deport those creatures back to Hell. More to the point, he had found an entire community of people who used and understood the magics he had. They valued the tools he had, and him for the ability to make them. However, as the months went on an on, and he got deeper and deeper into the underworld of this Orlando, the stakes got higher and higher. The higher ups of the Down Below were moving their pawns in Orlando. Big things were happening. Demons, the likes of which had no right to walking the Earth, were popping up with alarming frequency. Stories were circulating about terrible things happening abroad. Eddy is, and always was, a realistic man. He could read the writing on the wall, and the message was not hopeful. Just a matter of time, he could tell. The world was gonna end bloody. He just didn't expect to be so close when it happened. For Whom the Bell Tolls To put it simply; Eddy got the attention of a very powerful demon. As things proceeded to get worse and worse, he realized that there was some kind of struggle for power going on in the Pit- and one side wanted him in their pocket. Obviously, Eddy was not interested in playing any part in a power-play, but demons aren't exactly prone to take no for an answer either. And, of course, as soon as it became clear that he was important to one demon, the other took a vested interest in him. Meaning, of course, that he now had a price on his head. For months, Eddy was on the run. The tricks he had learned and the tools at his disposal bought him days of rest at a time, but there is no real killing a demon. And, if you can't kill the thing coming after you, you will be on the run for a while. Eventually, they caught up with him. In Montana, of all places. For a while there, it looked like he was really screwed. It was only after a few weeks of being held, and the timely interference by a few old friends, that he managed to slip out of the demon's grasp. On the run once more, he was still looking over his shoulder day and night. With a plague ravaging half the south and snowstorms blanketing an unnatural portion of the Northern Hemisphere, droughts throughout Asia and civil wars from South Africa to Ukraine- Things weren't looking good. Eventually, they caught up with him again. This time, well… He did the only thing he could think to do. After all, it had gotten him out of a tight spot before. It's not like he didn't know there'd be consequences… '''Current Activities: Soundtrack Quotes * "Hah! First!" * "Rookie mistake." * "That looks like a whole lot of not my problem!" * "*garbled screaming*" * "Okay. I need you to do one thing. Go in there, and as subtly as you can, tell them that if Lucifer asks, I'm not here." * "GOD DAMN IT, THAT IS NOT SUBTLE!!!!!" * "I'm helping!!" Rumors * Is actually a pretty cool guy. * Might be easy to get in bed with when sober. * Used to be "Crazy" Eddie White, until he sold the color to a homeless man for the Golden Gate Bridge. * May have a near infinite supply of whiskey in his coat pockets, not all of it from this dimension. * Has his own airliner known as the Crazy Train. * Has an actual "Magic Eight Ball." * His blood may in fact be Power Thirst. * He kicked Mother Nature in the face with his ENERGY LEGS! * He's rich. Like, super rich. Like, RIDICULOUSLY rich. He just lives on the streets because, quote, "If you don't have a home it's harder to catch you at home." OOC Information Player Name: Email Address: